Enterprise Push Server in ICEFaces

What is Enterprise Push Server?

In ICEfaces EE 2, the Enterprise Push Server (EPS) is built to manage singleAjax Push blocking connection(s) with the client browser and share it with any number of deployed ICEfaces applications and portlets, in both stand-alone and clustered deployments. The Enterprise Push Server delivers key additional features targeted at large-scale and high-availability enterprise deployments. Specifically, the Enterprise Push Servers:

• Integrates with major open source and commercial application servers to provide high-scalability and fail-over support for clustered Ajax Push-enabled ICEfaces applications.
• Provides distributed management of Push blocking connection to any number of deployed ICEfaces applications and portlets in both a stand-alone and clustered environments.
• Designed to Load-balance for failover of blocking push connections.
• Supports Servlet 3.0 Asynchronous Request Processing (ARP) integration for thread-level scalability.

Enterprise Push Server is required for deploying multiple Ajax Push applications to the same domain. It delivers push server capabilities and key features targeted at enterprise deployments in either stand-alone or cluster deployment environments.

5 Things to Know About Enterprise Push Server

1. Enterprise Push Server enables the delivery of collaborative rich web applications through Ajax Push.
2. It integrates with major open source and commercial application servers to provide high-scalability and fail-over support for clustered Ajax Push-enabled ICEfaces applications.
3. Provides distributed management of Push blocking connection to any number of deployed ICEfaces applications and portlets in both a stand-alone and clustered environments.
4. Designed to Load-balance for failover of blocking push connections.
5. Supports Asynchronous Request Processing (ARP) integration for thread-level scalability.

ICEfaces EE 2.0 is Now Available!

ICEfaces Enterprise Edition (EE) 2.0 is a JSF 2 ready, enterprise-grade development framework, designed to allow enterprise application developers to quickly design, test and deploy rich collaborative web applications.

ICEfaces EE 2.0 provides enterprise-grade features and capabilities not available in ICEfaces 2 open-source releases. It includes additional enterprise technologies, features, and advanced documentation designed to simplify and enhance your ICEfaces project lifecycle from development and testing, to deployment.

ICEfaces EE 2.0 is certified and fully tested against an extensive matrix of open source and commercial Java EE technologies. Key features of ICEfaces EE 2.0 include:

• Certified Code-base
• Commercial Technology Integrations
• Enterprise Components
• Testing Resources
• Enterprise Push Server (EPS)
• Enterprise Deployment Guides
• Enterprise-Level Support Options

ICEfaces 2.0.1 is an official maintenance release featuring over 110 fixes and improvements.

Notable changes included in this release are:

• New Supported Platforms?
• - Chrome 10, Firefox 4.0, IE 9
• - GlassFish 3.1, JBoss 6.0 and Liferay Portal 5 and 6
• - CDI / Weld
• Optimized JavaScript for the ICEfaces Components
• Faster Page Loading
• Mojarra JSF 2.1 and associated support updates
• Optimized Window Scope initialization
• Various Single Submit Improvements
• Updated Tutorials & Sample Applications

ICEfaces 2.0 Training

ICEsoft offers online training options to fit your specific needs. ICEfaces Training is developer led using experienced ICEfaces developers with several years of JSF and ICEfaces development experience. All our courses include hands-on exercises and labs to ensure knowledge transfer.

Introduction to ICEfaces and JSF (updated to ICEfaces 2 and JSF 2)

This 9 hour online course provides overview into Java Server Faces (JSF) and teaches the basics of developing Rich Enterprise Applications using ICEfaces and JSF. Students will be introduced to the MVC (Model View Controller) architecture of JSF, event-handling, data binding and validation. The course walks attendees through the ICEfaces architecture, component library and unique features such as Ajax push and page level design. Students will learn how to install, and configure their local environment and will develop and deploy a basic ICEfaces application.

ICEfaces in Portals with PortletFaces Bridge

ICEfaces 2 uses the open source PortletFaces Bridge project to provide a much improved portal development experience. The PortletFaces Bridge is based in part on the JSR 329 standard, and provides advanced support for JSF 2.0 Portal applications. Using the improvements in both JSF 2 and Portlet 2, the PortletFaces Bridge now directs all Ajax requests to ICEfaces without bypassing the portlet container while maintaing a rich UI experience by avoiding full page renders.

With the PortletFaces Bridge, ICEfaces Ajax portal integration adheres to the Portlet 2.0 specification and supports most of the JSR 286 Portlet 2.0 API.

The PortletFaces Bridge is tested and shipped with the ICEfaces 2 distribution and can be used to develop portlet applications with ICEfaces.

ICEfaces 1.x Brings Ajax and JSF to Portals

ICEfaces 1.x introduces easy, transparent use of Ajax in JavaServer Faces (JSF) applications. ICEfaces 1.x provides the same “Ajax over JSF” benefits to portlet developers by providing a simple, generic mechanism for bridging the portlet and JSF lifecycles. By using ICEfaces 1.x, developers can build JSF portlets with automatic support for Ajax, providing a rich user experience where portlets can be smoothly updated without disruption to other portlets on the page. In addition, using Ajax Push, an action in one portlet can be used to trigger changes and updates in other portlets, allowing for a form of Inter-Portlet Communication (IPC) that was unavailable in the Portlet 1.x API. In addition, all these features are available and supported across several leading portal platforms.

ICEfaces 2 and the PortletFaces Bridge

The advent of the Portlet 2.x and JSF 2.x specifications ushered in a host of new features that were previously unavailable in the older portlet and JSF implementations. JSF 2.x now provides native support for Ajax and Portlet 2.x now supports IPC. There are also standard specifications for JSF portal bridges which are designed to be transferrable across portal platforms.

ICEfaces 2 now ties all of these together for an even better portlet development experience. ICEfaces 2 uses the PortletFaces Bridge, a portlet bridge based in part on theJSR-329 standard, including advanced support for JSF 2.0, to provide a much improved portal development experience. The PortletFaces Bridge cleanly isolates the work of meshing the Portlet 2 API and lifecycle with the JSF 2 API and lifecycle.

[ In the second part of this
tutorial on JSTL, the author explains how the tags in the core-group can be
used in JSP pages, with a number of simpleexamples.]

We are now ready toexperiment with all the tags in the
‘core’ library. The core tags have the following uniform‘uri’.

‘http://java.sun.com/jstl/core'

===============================

( However, in the book by Hans
Bergstentitled,"Java
Server Pages" ( third edition), (OReilly pub)the
uri is consistently given as :

'http://java.sun.com/jsp/jstl/core'.It looks as if there has been some
change in specification and grammar, after it was published.

This
appears to be wrong asthe server threwexception.The correct uri is :

The
prefix is‘c:’

The following tags are available in the
‘core’ library.

( Remember them as a dozen!).

<c:set

<c ut

<c:iftest= “

<c:choose,<c:when ,<c:otherwise

<c:forEach

<c:forTokens

<c:import

<c:url

<c:redirect

<c:param

———————————————–

We
will now see simplest illustrations for the above tags.There
are a dozen demos, to bring out the features of each of these tags.

—————————————

demo1.jspuses<c:set&
<c:outtags.

:We create demo1.jspas:

e:tomcat5webappsrootdemo1.jsp

—————————————–

//demo1.jsp

<%@
page contentType="text/html" %>

<%@
taglibprefix="c"uri="http://java.sun.com/jstl/core"%>

<html>

<bodybgcolor=lightblue>

<formmethod=postaction="demo1.jsp">

NAME <inputtype=textname="text1"><br>

PLACE<inputtype=textname="text2"><br>

<input type=submit>

</form>

NAME:<c:outvalue="${param.text1}"/><br>

PLACE:<c:outvalue="${param.text2}"/>

</body>

In all the
previous examples, we invoked the JSP file through a htmlfile. But, in demo1.jsp, we areposting the page
to itself.( in asp.net style!).( but there is no
'retention of data' , unlike asp.net).

We start
Tomcat5, and type the urlas :

‘http://localhost:8080/demo1.jsp’.in the browser.We get a form with two text boxes and a submit
button. We fill up the textboxes with ‘name’ and ‘place’ and submit.The demo1.jsp executes and displays thevalues entered by
the user.due to the JSTL tags

<c utvalue=”${param.text1}/>etc.

That is
about our first and introductory example.

———–
—————————————

The second example is very important. When
the user enters data in a number of fields, it is tedious to collect the data
and transfer it to jsp page for processing. In our
example, we are collecting data about a player,such as his name, place and game. We
can have much more but we are restricting for space considerations. JSP has an
action tag , known as 'jsp:setProperty'.
Using this along with a standard javabean, we can
extract data and transfer it to our program in a single step.

The syntax
is

<jsp:useBean

id="bean1"class="ourbeans.player">

<jsp:setProperty

name="bean1"property="*"/>

</jsp:useBean>

the * sign denotes 'all').

—–

But, we should first create the 'player ' bean
with all the attributes and getter & setter methods, as shown.

———————————————

//player.java

packageourbeans;

public class player

{

Stringname;

Stringplace;

Stringgame;

public player()

{

name="";

place="
";

game="
";

}

//—————————

public voidsetName(String a)

{name=a; }

public void setPlace(String b)

{place=b; }

public void setGame(String c)

{game=c;}

//——————————

public StringgetName()

{ returnname; }

public StringgetPlace()

{ returnplace; }

public StringgetGame()

{ returngame; }

}

———————————

In demo2.jsp, we collect the data and then displaythe data
entered by the user.

Note that
instead of {param.text1}, we are using {bean1.name}. We should carefully name
the html form controls with the corresponding attribute names given in the
bean. We cannot name the controls as 'text1' etc, now!

<c utvalue="${bean1.name}"/>

<c utvalue="${bean1.place}"/>

<c utvalue="${bean1.game}"/>

—

We get correct result.

=============================================

//demo2.jsp

<%@
page contentType="text/html" %>

<%@
taglib prefix="c"

uri="http://java.sun.com/jstl/core"%>

<html>

<body>

<form
method=postaction="demo2.jsp">

<jsp:useBean id="bean1"
class="ourbeans.player">

<jsp:setPropertyname="bean1"
property="*"/>

</jsp:useBean>

Name
<inputtype=textname="name"><br>

Place<inputtype=textname="place"><br>

Game<inputtype=textname="game"><br>

<input
type=submit>

</form>

Name:
<c utvalue="${bean1.name}"/><br>

Place:
<c ut
value="${bean1.place}"/><br>

Game:
<c ut
value="${bean1.game}"/>

</body>

</html>

=============================================

Once
again, it will be noticed that there is no java code in this example, as
everything is being done by tags, only..

***********************************************

We
are now ready to take up examples for 'condition'tags.

There are two types of 'condition tags'.

namely, <c:if>&<c:choose>.

In the
third demo, we learn how to use the <c:iftag.

———————————————-

//demo3.jsp

<%@
page contentType="text/html" %>

<%@
taglib prefix="c" uri="http://java.sun.com/jstl/core"%>

<html>

<bodybgcolor=lightblue>

<formmethod=postaction=demo3.jsp>

<selectname="combo1">

<optionvalue="sam">sam

<optionvalue="tom">tom

</select>

<inputtype=submit>

</form>

<c:setvar="s"value="${param.combo1}"/>

<c ut
value="${s}"/>

<br>

<c:iftest="${seq'sam'}">

<c utvalue="Good
Morning…SAM!"/>

</c:if>

<c:iftest="${s=
='tom'}">

<c utvalue=" How Are
You?….TOM!"/>

</c:if>

</body>

The above code is no ‘Rocket-Science’ as
Americanauthors say!But
, if we are carelessin typing the names
‘sam’ or ‘tom’ in the test condition, we could spend
hours together , trying to coax this code into functioning! We should not leave
space after the single quotein the 'test expression'. Second point worth noting in the above
example is that we can use either ==( double equal to) or eqto test equality.

***********************************************

In
the fourth example which follows, we take up <c:choose> tag.

The
syntax is:

<c:choose >

<c:whentest="">

<c therwise>something</c:otherwise>

</c:choose>

The
peculiarity to be noted here is thatunlike <c:if ,
where we had to explicitlyuse <c:out for printing , no such <c:out
has been used here., and yet the result is displayed,

because 'choose' includes 'displaying'..

When
we choose '7', "select between 1 & 5 " will be displayed!

———————————————–

//demo4.jsp

<%@
page contentType="text/html" %>

<%@
taglib prefix="c" uri="http://java.sun.com/jstl/core"%>

<html>

<bodybgcolor=lightblue>

<formmethod=postaction="demo3.jsp">

<select name="combo1">

<option value="1">1</option>

<option value="2">2</option>

<option value="3">3</option>

<option value="4">4</option>

<option value="5">5</option>

<option value="7">7</option>

</select>

<inputtype=submit>

<c:setvar="s"value="${param.combo1}"/>

Today
is

<br>

<font
size=24 color=red>

<c:choose>

<c:whentest="${s==1}">Sunday
</c:when>

<c:whentest="${s==2}">Monday</c:when>

<c:whentest="${s==3}">Tuesday</c:when>

<c:whentest="${s==4}">Wednesday</c:when>

<c:whentest="${s==5}">Thursday</c:when>

<p class="MsoN

Introduction

If you are getting the following error while running the JSP 2.0 in Tomcat server.
It means the application is missing JSTL jar file. If you add standard.jar and jstl.jar
the problem will be solved.

1
2
3
4
5
6
7

java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: javax/servlet/jsp/jstl/core/Config
	com.sun.faces.application.view.JspViewHandlingStrategy.executePageToBuildView(JspViewHandlingStrategy.java:286)
	com.sun.faces.application.view.JspViewHandlingStrategy.buildView(JspViewHandlingStrategy.java:123)
	com.sun.faces.lifecycle.RenderResponsePhase.execute(RenderResponsePhase.java:106)
	com.sun.faces.lifecycle.Phase.doPhase(Phase.java:103)
	com.sun.faces.lifecycle.LifecycleImpl.render(LifecycleImpl.java:139)
	javax.faces.webapp.FacesServlet.service(FacesServlet.java:311)